Saturday PM ~ TheFrontPageCover

[Rudy Tirre]

TheFrontPageCover

~ Featuring ~

Millennial Idealism vs. Islamist Reality 

by Culture Beat

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328 NSA Documents Reveal Vast Network of Iranian Agents,

Details of a Key Intelligence Coup and a Fervor

for Voice-Matching Technology

by Margot Williams, Talya Cooper, Henrik Moltke and Micah Lee

{ theintercept.com } ~ It began not by tapping enemy insurgents’ phones or capturing their emails, but by following the money... When the National Security Agency  discovered that Iran may have been buying computer chips from the United States, routing them through a U.S. ally, and potentially supplying them to detonate bombs against U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, it credited so-called economic intelligence with the find. And the solution was not a death blow delivered by the military, but rather a new regulation on the export of certain technologies via the Commerce Department, which the spy agency said would end up “saving American and coalition lives.” The unusual strategy of tracing monetary flows to stop explosions is one of many significant disclosures contained in a batch of 328 internal NSA documents provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden and released by The Intercept today after research and redaction. Also included in the material, which originates from SIDtoday, the newsletter of the agency’s core Signals Intelligence Directorate, is the untold story of how intelligence related to Al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi  was finally acquired; an assessment that a “vast … network of Iranian agents”  operated in Iraq and influenced its government; a major push to hone the agency’s voice identification technology; details on how NSA staff deployed abroad viewed, and sometimes stereotyped, their host countries; and grumbling about having to comply with public-records laws...

https://theintercept.com/2018/08/15/nsa-edward-snowden-whistleblower-document-leaks/?utm_source=The+Intercept+Newsletter&utm_campaign=c1a825bb0e-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_08_18&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e00a5122d3-c1a825bb0e-131896129
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Pentagon: China Boosts Nuclear Readiness 

by Bill Gertz

{ freebeacon.com } ~ China added significant numbers of bombers to its military forces in the past year as part of a large-scale military buildup targeting the United States... a Pentagon's report on the Chinese military says. The annual report to Congress also reveals that China's People's Liberation Army increased long-range bomber flights further from Chinese coasts and conducted training for airstrikes against the U.S. bases in Asia. "Over the last three years, the PLA has rapidly expanded its overwater bomber operating areas, gaining experience in critical maritime regions and likely training for strikes against U.S. and allied targets," the report said. This year's report, made public Thursday night, is 30-pages longer than the 2017 version and highlights China's growing asymmetric warfare capabilities. Those capabilities include space weapons, advanced cyber attack capabilities, information warfare tools, and electronic warfare systems designed for short, high-intensity conflicts...

https://freebeacon.com/national-security/pentagon-china-boosts-nuclear-readiness/?utm_source=Freedom+Mail&utm_campaign=5513f74ec8-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_08_17_07_15_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b5e6e0e9ea-5513f74ec8-45611665

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Gender Confusion: A Tool of the Left

by Peter Skurkiss

{ americanthinker.com } ~ The dummycrats-Democratic Party has gone off the deep end in many more ways than just pushing socialism... One sign is the fanatical embrace of identity politics, which has become the hallmark of the Party of scumbag/liar-nObama (POO). Look at Vermont. There, the dummycrats-Democrats' primary race for governor was won by Christine Hallquist. What is unusual is that Hallquist calls himself a "transgender woman." To put it more accurately and without any politically correct gloss,  Hallquist is a male pretending to be a woman. His pretending isn't all that convincing, as evidenced by this YouTube clip from Time magazine. It's worth a  minute's time to see Hallquist to connect a face and a voice to the name and see what the dummycrats-Democrats are pushing...

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/08/gender_confusion_a_tool_of_the_left.html

VIDEO:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2NIxmCF4iI

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scumbag/commie-John Brennan: Give It a Rest Already

by Elise Cooper

{ americanthinker.com } ~ scumbag/commie-John Brennan's security clearance has finally been revoked. Now he is playing the victim card, but per usual, there is more than meets the eye... American Thinker interviewed a number of former CIA directors while scumbag/liar-nObama was president. Although they may have vehemently disagreed with policy, they did it in a civil manner, without the disgusting hyperbolic language and name-calling. scumbag/commie-Brennan should take his own words and reflect upon them. The argument by a former CIA operative: "Traditionally, since 1947, former directors have kept their security clearances with the idea that the seniors could provide advice, counsel, and become red teams for the current director. The benefit comes with the different perspectives as they sit in a room together offering a diversity of opinions about any strategic issues. The only way they could have these conversations is having their clearance maintained.  scumbag/commie-Brennan served as President scumbag/liar-nObama's chief counter-terrorism adviser from 2008 until he was confirmed as CIA chief in 2013, holding that position until 2017. Yet, since he did not do a very good job in keeping Americans safe, who would really want to consult with him? Taking a stroll down memory lane, there were numerous terrorist attacks and attempts in the U.S. under his watch...

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/08/john_brennan_give_it_a_rest_already.html

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The NSA Has An Advice Columnist Seroiusly

by Peter Maass

{ theintercept.com } ~ What if the National Security Agency had its own advice columnist? What would the eavesdroppers ask about?... You don’t need to guess. An NSA official, writing under the pen name “Zelda,” has actually served at the agency as a Dear Abby for spies. Her “Ask Zelda!” columns, distributed on the agency’s intranet and accessible only to those with the proper security clearance, are among the documents leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. The columns are often amusing – topics include co-workers falling asleep on the job, sodas being stolen from shared fridges, supervisors not responding to emails, and office-mates who smell bad. But one of the most intriguing involves a letter from an NSA staffer who complains that his or her boss is spying on employees. In the letter, which Zelda published in a column on September 9, 2011, the employee calls himself “Silenced in SID” – referring to the Signals Intelligence Directorate, the heart of the NSA’s surveillance operations. Zelda’s column, headlined “Watching Every Word in Snitch City,” offers an ironic insight into a spy agency where the spies apparently resent being spied upon. Here’s the scenario: when the boss sees co-workers having a quiet conversation, he wants to know what is being said it’s mostly work related. He has his designated “snitches” and expects them to keep him apprised of all the office gossip – even calling them at home and expecting a run-down! This puts the “designees” in a really awkward position; plus, we’re all afraid any offhand comment or anything said in confidence might be either repeated or misrepresented...  https://theintercept.com/2014/03/07/nsa-advice-columnist-seriously/?utm_source=The+Intercept+Newsletter&utm_campaign=c1a825bb0e-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_08_18&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e00a5122d3-c1a825bb0e-131896129 

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Millennial Idealism vs. Islamist Reality 

by Culture Beat:  When we first saw information about the death of two Americans on a bike trip through ISIS territory, we thought it was a parody. Unfortunately, it wasn’t.

             Last year, a Millennial couple, Jay Austin and Lauren Geoghegan, quit their jobs in Washington, DC, and departed for a year-long biking tour around the world. According The Pluralist, “Austin, a vegan who worked for the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, and Geoghegan, a vegetarian who worked in the Georgetown University admissions office, decided that they were wasting their lives working.”
               Before departing, Austin wrote: “I’ve missed too many sunsets while my back was turned. Too many thunderstorms went unwatched, too many gentle breezes unnoticed.”
               Their biking trip ended in tragedy on 29 July in Tajikistan, when five Islamists drove their car into the group of cyclists, then emerged with knives, killing Austin and Geoghegan and two others.
               Before the naive couple was murdered by the Islamic State adherents, Austin wrote:
               “You watch the news and you read the papers and you’re led to believe that the world is a big, scary place. People, the narrative goes, are not to be trusted. People are bad. People are evil. People are axe murderers and monsters and worse. I don’t buy it. Evil is a make-believe concept we’ve invented to deal with the complexities of fellow humans holding values and beliefs and perspectives different than our own…”
               Regarding Donald Trump, Austin wrote on his trip blog from a location in the Middle East:
               “On the television across the room, Al Jazeera plays softly. Donald Trump has just announced his plans to move an embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and the Muslim world is visibly upset. … As a clip plays of a sullen Trump waddling across the screen, I do my best to disappear into the soft plush of the couch cushion behind me. But American as we may be, no one here seems to mind.”
               Unfortunately for Austin, Geoghegan, and their two friends, there will be no more “sunsets … thunderstorms … and gentle breezes.”

~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/57718?mailing_id=3684&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.3684&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body